I'm not sure, if AF has retrofitted RAAS on their fleet. Even if they did so, isn't the "on taxiway take off alert" optional?

http://www51.honeywell.com/aero/comm...-Worksheet.pdf

(see 5.4)

the aural msg ON TAXIWAY is triggered at 40 kts on the ground and they stopped at 30 kts...
the RAAS is installed on the entire fleet since a couple of years now

"Are you ready for a threat and error brief."...."Chickens can fly...and we are human, and can fly much better than chickens..HOWEVER...Chickens were meant to fly!"

Yes...lock me up if I say that before every departure..and of course, I don't.
.
Point is, from the moment we enter our cockpits, we are out of our natural environment, so we must ALL be very careful....from the 20k veteran to the .2K newbie.

Am 55, and it has never been more true than today,Sacrebleu!

Despite this incident , I think their safety Record is increasing.At least the still Did not destroy sny plane during the last 12 monthes.

Those stats for Europe.
 

I think that rather than express the fatality rates as a % of average as they do on that site, a better way is to test statistically the statement:

"They are fundamentally the same", is it possible that the differences are caused by chance?

In this case, the chances of AF being just unlucky are about 4.5% , Turkish 3%, Aeroflot about 1 in 1500! So, yes a concern.

You cannot really say much about the rest, BA,LH, Alitalia & Iberia seem to have dodged about 5 between them, but even then there is a 1 in 3 or 4 chance that they just got lucky, and if you make your own luck, let us hope they continue to do so.

RyanAir & Easy - looking good but to quote the Chinese "too soon to tell".

Still, fatalities data is a bit of a blunt instrument, I would rather deal with how often the holes nearly lined up if I had to make a meaningful ranking.

And again one more incident AF A340 Guadeloupe 2011
 

The French BEA released their final report in French (later released English version) concluding the probable cause of the serious incident was:

Inadequate monitoring of flight parameters, which resulted in the crew not noticing the autopilot had disconnected and a deviation from assigned altitude after reflex actions at the controls.

Incident: Air France A343 near Guadeloupe on Jul 22nd 2011, rapid climb and approach to stall in upset

Between January 1995 and July 2010 I flew 1.463 flights as a passenger. 998 long haul, 465 short haul using a multitude of different carriers worldwide. Only one long haul (Concorde ex JFK) and one short haul (an internal connection) were AF. I am an admitted francophile, but my instinct always steered me well clear of AF and the unprofessionalism of the cc. If I had doubts about the cc, I guess that influenced my sub conscious view of those on the fd. CDG would have been as convenient start/end point for me as LON. Just a personal view, guys.

Quote:
The pilot flying realised at that point they were at 38,000 feet and queried the pilot not flying whether they weren't assigned to FL350.
- can we believe we are reading this? What are these crews doing with the instrument panel in front of them?

BOAC : you are right but they got what they asked for :
1) PNF presses autopilot disconnect
2) PNF pull stick back 75% for 6 seconds
3) a/c climbs with 2000ft/min initially then pitch increases to 12 degr up and the vertical speed increases through 5700 feet per minute,

This not automation / Airbus computer logic that put the aircraft at 38.000 ft at Mach .66 with 12 degr nose up...

How far back counts as "Historically"?

They have operated the largest domestic and regional fleet in Australia for the last 22 years!!

Scenario "a la AF447" .. or better ... "a la Air France"
How far back counts as "Historically"?

What's most alarming after reading the report is that this happened post AF447. If you haven't read the above link, do. It makes alarming reading - scary.

Have AF actually implemented any upset recovery training program? Judging by the response of this crew the answer is no - or they were asleep during the training. Pitch of 12 degrees nose up at FL370! 6000 fpm ROC. Checklist to see if AP is engaged :ugh: Attempted PA to pax by PF during upset.......

It is difficult not to come to the conclusion that there is a serious culture/arrogance issue within AF. What's the saying..."a rotting fish stinks from the head". Does AF need a top to bottom audit like Korean had a few years back?

If this was a far eastern outfit everyone would be screaming "ban them". This is the flag carrier of the 2nd (?) most prominent country in Europe - that is really worrying.

They had already one few years ago (Rapport Colin) pointing many of the problems discussed here and in AF447 case
But .. seems it was useless ....

Bad
 

This is truly unbelievable what incompetent pilots work for air France.
No lesson whatsoever has been learned.
Something fundamental must be going wrong in this company.
If things are not changed there drastically and quickly more lives will be lost.

The question is not if they will have another crash, but when.

Can anyone enlighten us how air France works internally?

I think they should be put on the EU no fly list, as they are CLEARLY UNSAFE.

I Would certainly never fly with them

Another, again..?

In the FDR print out it looks to me that the FO nose up side stick coincides with an actual pitch down of the aircraft body angle almost perfectly. Was the PNF simply reacting instinctively to a sudden pitch down of the nose?
Standing by to be corrected.

I hear that way back in the 1960's the word on the street was:

'Take a chance ...with Air France' .

some crystal ball they had then eh?

But then again they also had BOAC: 'Better on a camel' :ouch:

Only the PNF himself is in a position to correct you. PPRuNers can only speculate. A note in the report says the airplane encountered a head-on gust of 25 kt, followed a few seconds later by an upward gust of 35 kt. The airplane probably pitched down in response to the upward gust. The PNF's instinctive reaction may well have been in response to the combination of overspeed warning, g-force and pitch-down movement.

Hazelnuts39 :
An " instinctive reaction " ? and when you are PNF ?

ATC Watcher.... If I am PNF and the aircraft manoeuvres abruptly it is definitely my instinct to correct/control by applying control inputs regardless of who is PF.
The same is true for TL movements. As a rule I normally remember who's job it is prior to doing that though. But the instinct is still there.